A shaky peace in Darfur slipping

Aug. 31, 2006

Updated Aug. 21, 2013 1:17 p.m.

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On patrol: A rebel with the National Redemption Front, an alliance formed by the groups who have not signed the Darfur Peace Agreement, carries his weapon in an outpost in Umm Sidir, north Darfur. CANDACE FEIT, REUTERS

On patrol: A rebel with the National Redemption Front, an alliance formed by the groups who have not signed the Darfur Peace Agreement, carries his weapon in an outpost in Umm Sidir, north Darfur. CANDACE FEIT, REUTERS

EL FASHER, Sudan - At the airstrip here in the heart of Darfur, the Ilyushin cargo planes fly in day after day, their holds packed with the stuff of war: troops, trucks, bombs and guns.

So far, negotiations over a proposed U.N. force to shore up the shaky peace in Darfur have limped along with no sign of compromise. The opposing sides in the conflict now seem headed toward a large-scale military confrontation, bringing Darfur to the edge of a new abyss.

"Unfortunately, things seem to be headed in that direction," said Gen. Collins Ihekire, commander of the beleaguered 7,000-member African Union force that is enforcing a fragile peace agreement between the government and one rebel group.

Nearly four months after signing the agreement, the government is preparing a fresh assault against the rebel groups that refused to sign. Years of conflict have already killed hundreds of thousands of people here and sent 2.5 million fleeing their homes. But that may be a prelude of the death likely to come from further fighting, hunger and disease. In the past few months, killings of aid workers and hijackings of their vehicles, mostly by rebel groups, have forced aid groups to curtail programs to feed, clothe and shelter hundreds of thousands of people.

"We have less access now than we did in 2004 when things were really bad," said one senior aid official in El Fasher, speaking on the condition of anonymity because outspoken aid workers have been penalized and expelled by the government. "If there were a major military offensive you could be looking at a complete evacuation of humanitarian workers in North Darfur, which would leave millions without a lifeline."

Diplomatically, Sudan has taken a hard line, refusing to allow any international peacekeepers other than the small and relatively powerless African Union force already in place.

The U.N. Security Council plans to vote today on a resolution that would replace the 7,000 African Union troops with some 21,000 U.N. troops and police officers, but the resolution specifies that the troops will not deploy without the consent of the Sudanese government.

A visit to Khartoum this week by Jendayi E. Frazer, assistant secretary of state for African Affairs, failed to produce an agreement, potentially leaving the people of Darfur without any international peacekeepers to protect them. The African Union force has only enough money to keep going until Sept. 30, when its mandate officially ends. As it is now, its troops have not been paid, in some cases for months. It is perpetually running short of fuel, food and equipment, and its suppliers, who also have waited months for payment, are reluctant to make new deliveries. Helicopter flights that deliver all but the most essential goods - food and medicine for the troops - have been canceled.

Beyond that, the force is finding itself increasingly drawn into the battle between the government and the rebels. An attack on a fuel convoy earlier this month was suspected to be the work of rebels. Two Rwandan soldiers were killed in an intense firefight that lasted hours. Rebel leaders deny that they were involved in the ambush, but nevertheless say that the African Union is biased because it brokered a peace agreement they reject.

Most ominous is the looming confrontation between government troops and rebel holdouts, set to take place on a battlefield that is home to 250,000 people, and could easily set off a chain of battles across Darfur. "It would be catastrophic," said another senior aid official with a different agency, asking not to be named for fear of retribution from the Sudanese government. "In terms of loss of life it could dwarf the killings in 2003 and 2004."

In that period alone, at least 180,000 people died from attacks on villages by government forces and their allied Arab militias, known as the janjaweed, and in battles with non-Arab rebel groups seeking greater power in the region. The violence brought on widespread hunger and disease, often the most lethal killers here.

El Fasher was once a sleepy state capital in an impoverished, backward part of Sudan. Now it is a garrison town swarming with government troops in crisp new uniforms driving shiny trucks mounted with 50-millimeter guns.

The government has made no secret of its intentions - it submitted a plan to the Security Council earlier this month stating its plan to use 10,500 of its own troops to crush the rebellion, a move that would violate the peace agreement it just signed, according to Ihekire.

The rebel movements that refused to sign the Darfur peace agreement have massed in a vast swath of territory north of here, gaining strength and flexing their muscle in attacks on government troops and their allies, as well as on the African Union force.

In an interview deep in the territory they hold, commanders of the new rebel alliance, the National Redemption Front, said they were ready for a fight.

"Our capabilities are unlimited, on the air and on the ground, to repel them," said Jarnabi Abdul Kareem, a top rebel commander.

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